Kickstarting a free, open archive of recordings of all of Chopin

Erik sez, "Three years ago, Musopen raised nearly $70,000 to create public domain recordings of works by Beethoven, Brahms, Mozart, Schubert, and others.

Now they're running a new campaign with a simple but ambitious objective: 'To preserve indefinitely and without question everything Chopin created. To release his music for free, both in 1080p video and 24 bit 192kHz audio. This is roughly 245 pieces.'"

They need $75K. $75 gets you a letterpress listening guide. As with all crowdfunding projects, be aware that they may not deliver, though this team has a good track record on similar projects that speaks well of their chances this time. Caveat donor.

We are asking for your help to free the life's work of Frédéric Chopin.

Why now?
It is 164 years after Chopin's death. His music is well into the public domain, yet most people consume it as if it were still copyrighted: from CDs, iTunes, or Youtube videos (many of which are copyrighted).
We think Chopin deserves better.

Why Chopin?
Most public domain music is limited to the classical genre (1920's and before), but the goals of Musopen are not limited to one genre, so we want an artist that has broad appeal. Among the most enduringly popular composers, Chopin stands out. He also composed an amount of music which is manageable for us to record. If we had chosen Mozart, our funding goal would have to have another zero at the end.

We also wanted an artist that would be versatile, enabling many projects to make use of his music.

It doesn't hurt that he just celebrated his 200th birthday three years ago. This is a belated gift but one we think he would appreciate.

Set Chopin Free

(Thanks, Erik!)